


Lifeline

by Sarea Okelani (sarea)



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-27
Updated: 2012-05-27
Packaged: 2017-11-06 02:21:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/413650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarea/pseuds/Sarea%20Okelani
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the aftermath of Manhattan, Clint tries to remember what "normal" was like, but Natasha's not making it easy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lifeline

**Author's Note:**

> This is fairly lighthearted in tone. I've been reading some dark, angsty things and while I love dark, angsty things, and may write something dark and angsty eventually, this is not that story. This asked (nicely) to be written first, so I did. A lot of the backstory is my headcanon. There's so much comic book canon, some of which contradicts itself, and some of which the movie has contradicted, so I felt free to deviate a bit too. :-) In the movie, I think Natasha wears her heart on her sleeve a bit – okay, maybe not her sleeve, maybe someplace a little more hidden, but the point is that she cares for Clint, she wasn't particularly subtle about it, and it doesn't take a Tony Stark to see it. :-) This story is for that Natasha. Many thanks to Robbie, who brings up Very Important Points such as "In the covers, or over the covers?" and Jade, who always manages to talk me off the ledge. Lyrics by Angels & Airwaves.

//\\\//

_If you hear a distant sound,  
And some footsteps by your side  
When the world comes crashing down  
I will find you if you hide_

//\\\//

After shawarma, after Thor has left and taken Loki with him, after Stark has returned to his expensive steel monstrosity, after Banner has gone back to a lab or saving puppies or whatever it is he does when he's not hanging out with them, after Rogers has taken off to wherever displaced old guys go, after after, things return to somewhat normal.

Given what Clint's been through recently, "somewhat normal" sounds like paradise.

While the Helicarrier is being repaired back to full combat condition, S.H.I.E.L.D. agents normally assigned to Headquarters who don't have a place to go are sent off to various crappy extended stay motels all over the country.

Clint, thankfully, has a place to go, a small apartment in Alexandria, Virginia, that he started renting three years ago. In fact, he has two other apartments, in Vienna and Shanghai, though he hasn't spent much time in either. He'd never thought about such things until meeting Natasha, who has so many little hidey holes all over the world that she made him feel inadequate. She was the one who'd helped him find the Alexandria place, which is fine, they all are, except nothing will ever feel like "home" the way his cramped quarters on the Helicarrier do.

At least the apartment is close to S.H.I.E.L.D.'s McLean base, near Langley, where he goes every day to work out and get in a few hours of practice. McLean's range isn't as good as he'd like, but it works in a pinch.

Clint is in one of the training rooms, waiting for Natasha, who strolls in just shy of being late. She has a place in D.C., which he's been to a few times but he doesn't like it, it feels weird, it's strange that it's supposed to be Natasha's but he doesn't know it well, doesn't know it the way he knows her room on the Helicarrier. There shouldn't be something of hers that he finds unfamiliar.

"Hi," she says, smiling, and Clint works very hard not to notice what he's definitely noticing, which is that her curves seem more pronounced than usual. It seems impossible that her skintight workout clothing could have gotten more skintight than he remembered them being, but this is apparently what has happened. This is another reason why things are "somewhat normal" instead of "normal." He used to be able to tune out Natasha's innate sexuality before. At least, most of the time. But since she brought him back to himself he's been less capable than usual of ignoring it. He doesn't know if it's what Loki did to his head or whether it's what Natasha did to his head. Or both.

"Is that a new thigh rig?" Clint says finally.

Natasha moves one leg closer to him, showing off the sheath. He looks away quickly, but not too quickly because she'll notice and call him on it. "Yes." She seems pleased. "I wanted to try it out, make sure it fits right. Don't want it getting in the way when I have to kick your ass again."

Clint can't help it; that makes him grin. He gestures with his hands. "Come at me, then, Gnat," he says, deliberately provoking her. He told her a long time ago that that's how he spells it in his head when he shortens her name. He means it with affection now, of course, but when he first said it, it was to piss her off.

Her first strike is quick, strong. Clint expects it after all this time, knows her strength and speed, but she still nearly gouges his throat. He likes that she keeps him on his toes. He prefers distance, of course, prefers the silence and solitude of setting up the perfect shot, the calculation that goes into gauging wind and velocity and strength. He likes the precision of it, the satisfaction of making a good hit.

But he always ensures his one-on-one combat skills are honed, because pesky targets don't always stay at a distance, and there's no one better to keep him sharp than Natasha. He aims a kick at her midriff and recovers quickly when she dodges it, swinging around for a backhanded strike, which she repays with a solid punch to his stomach. And on it goes, their dance, that old familiar routine that is somehow new and exhilarating every time. Clint finds relief in it, relief that this is still the same, that this has not changed, whatever else might have. At some point she introduces her knife, the flash of the metal making him dance a little more carefully, making him gauge not only how to avoid that sharp blade but how he can use it against her. But the next flash of metal he sees is not the knife but her zipper, the one between her breasts that seems fractionally lower than when they had started, exposing a creamy swell.

That second of hesitation costs him, and he feels the sting of her knife as it slices cleanly across his upper arm. It's only due to his reflexes that it doesn't do more damage than that.

Natasha lowers her knife and relaxes her fighting stance. "I cut you." She sounds surprised.

"I noticed." Clint can't meet her eyes. He's embarrassed. Not because the cut hurts – though it does – but because he let himself be distracted, and by something she wasn't even actively distracting him with. He gave himself more credit than that. He is a better fighter than that. Or at least he used to be, before Loki got into his head. "I should go." He gathers up his gear, sensing her gaze, but still can't look at her.

He hears the door of the training room open but pretends not to. "Clint?" Natasha calls when he's halfway down the hall.

He stops, then reluctantly turns around.

"The infirmary's that way." She indicates the other direction with a tilt of her head. "That might need stitches."

Clint looks at his bleeding arm, having forgotten about it already. "Right." He starts back down the hall in the opposite direction.

He really needs something to take the edge off.

//\\\//

Bob, one of the janitorial staff on nightshift, hooks him up. Clint goes to one of the smaller gyms that isn't used much anymore – it's small, dingy and cramped with older workout equipment – because he figures there's less of a chance someone will use it at this time of night. He's about to light up when the door opens. He's ready to blurt out an excuse, feeling like a 14-year-old in a liquor store with a fake license, before he realizes who it is.

Clint motions impatiently for Natasha to shut the door.

As she gets closer she sees what's in his hand. "Are you fucking kidding me?" The lightness of her tone and the amused twist of her lips tell him she's not really pissed. "I should report you."

"Sorry, Director Fury," he says, kind of obnoxiously.

Natasha just looks at him and grabs the matches out of his hand. A scrape of potassium chlorate against phosphorous and the match flares. Clint puts the joint in his mouth and bends close to the flame, letting the tip ignite. He takes a long drag, then inhales deep, keeping the smoke in his lungs. Already he can feel some of the tightness in him loosen.

She looks at him with a half smile, and when he still doesn't exhale she takes the joint from him. The tip of her tongue peeks out as she puts it in her mouth and closes her full red lips around it. She takes a pull of her own, pinning him with her eyes the whole time.

He finally lets out the smoke, coughing a bit.

Now she laughs, and the sound is like sex. Smoke-covered sex. Clint turns away after taking his joint back. This is clearly not helping as much as he'd hoped.

"This is your plan? Hide out and get baked?"

"For now." Clint looks pointedly at his gauze-wrapped arm. "Some nut did try to carve me up today." The cut wasn't as deep as they'd thought; no stitches required, though it is bandaged up pretty good. The medic on call was female, who, in his experience, tended to be more zealous about these things. 

"Barton, if I wanted a piece of you I'd have it," Natasha responds, and he shivers a little, because he is imagining a promise in that voice. There is something seriously wrong with him. If Natasha knew what he was thinking – if she even had an _inkling_ of the thoughts he's been having, she'd punch him, kill him, and castrate him... and he'd have to hope it was in that order.

Clint stretches out the same arm to show her the bite marks healing on his forearm. "Yeah, I know, you _bit_ me." There's no real accusation in his voice; they both know he deserved it. Or at least, whoever had been inhabiting his body had deserved it.

"Don't be a baby." She traces the marks on his skin with her index finger, making the hairs on his arm stand on end. "Maybe you'll have a scar." She doesn't sound too broken up about the possibility. In fact, if he wasn't currently crazy, he'd say she sounded happy.

Clint's phone beeps, and he takes the opportunity to check it and move away from Natasha, even though he doesn't really care who's trying to contact him or why.

**From: tony@starkindustries.com  
To: clint.barton@SHIELD.gov  
Subject: It's your lucky night**

**I'm in your neck of the woods. Laughing Lizard in ~30 minutes? Bring the lovely Agent Romanoff, the more the merrier.**

**TS**

"I gotta go," he says, taking one more puff then handing Natasha the rest of the joint. He generally dislikes social gatherings of any kind, but at the moment he'll take any excuse to get the hell out of there.

"You do? Why? Who was that?" She watches him put his jacket on, looking annoyed. To anyone else it wouldn't be obvious, she'd just seem mildly curious – Clint is sure Natasha and Coulson went to the same spy school – but he can tell. There's a slight crinkling at the corners of her eyes that gives it away.

"Stark. Guy thing." He heads for the door, not wanting to answer more specific questions.

"Stark guy thing?" he hears her say slightly incredulously as the door closes behind him.

//\\\//

Stark has chosen a table at the center of the room, of course, the better to see and be seen. Had Clint gotten there first, he would have picked somewhere in the back and to the side, where he could have a vantage point over the whole room and be near an exit. At Stark's table, he feels like an open target. Three shots of tequila haven't helped dull those nagging feelings.

 _What am I doing here?_ Clint asks himself, nursing his pint of IPA. He doesn't realize he's spoken out loud until Stark says, "The real question is why you didn't bring Agent Romanoff. Barton, are you secretly in love with me?"

Clint ignores this. Stark gave some kind of excuse about being in town for some kind of seminar the next day, but it's hard to know his real motives. Alexandria is only 230 miles from New York, give or take, which is a joy ride for Iron Man. Why's Stark _really_ here? And why did he contact Clint? And more importantly, why did Clint respond? He can't quite remember.

"Really, where _is_ Tasha?" Stark asks loudly, responding to the music having gotten suddenly higher in volume.

It shouldn't bother Clint to hear Stark call her that, it really shouldn't. As nicknames go it's fairly obvious. But it takes more effort than it should not to tell him to call her Agent Romanoff. "She was busy," Clint lies, remembering now why he had agreed to meet Stark. He'd needed to get away from Natasha before he gave in to his base impulses and did something ridiculous and unforgivable, like kiss her. Or bury his face in her chest. Both options have been close calls of late.

"Shame," says Stark, knowingly, which puts Clint in an even worse mood.

Before long, they're joined at their table by three women dressed in business casual attire, who have obviously recognized Stark. One of them sits next to Clint and introduces herself as "Cherry" over the pounding music. He isn't good at small talk, never has been. He's a loner by nature and doesn't have Stark's glib charm. Stark, on the other hand, is easily holding court with the other two women while Clint wonders when he can leave without seeming rude. Not that he's particularly concerned about that, either. If it comes down to it he'll just get up and walk out.

But if he does that, then what? He'll be back in his apartment with no distractions, nothing to do but think about Natasha and the way she looked when they were sparring earlier today. He tries not to think about her when he jerks off, but somehow it always seems to happen anyway. It's been especially bad since last week; he finds himself doing it multiple times a day, sometimes. He hasn't been this desperate since he was a fucking teenager, for God's sake. Obviously it's been way too long since he's gotten laid.

It occurs to him that he's pinpointed the problem, and the solution to his problem is conveniently right in front of him as well. What he needs is to get laid. This Cherry girl will do. She's attractive enough – blonde, bright eyed, with a ready smile; she's a little thin for his taste, doesn't look like she could crush a man's windpipe with her thighs, he'll probably have to treat her like a fragile doll, but on the positive side, she likes him, he can tell. She's barely looked at Stark, and keeps touching Clint's arm and using the loud music as an excuse to lean closer. It's kind of annoying, actually, but as she's going to be his ticket to oblivion tonight, he'll put up with it.

What is she saying? Why does she talk so much? Do all women talk this much? He doesn't know, because he's never around normal women. The women he knows are soldiers and spies. And Natasha, who he doesn't know how to categorize. He nods occasionally and downs his drink (which keeps getting topped off), and this seems to suffice, because Cherry just keeps smiling and talking. Clint starts to lose focus.

"You. Hey. you." Stark snaps his fingers in their direction, and they finally realize he's addressing Cherry. Clint sees that the two women Stark was talking to have disappeared. "I wouldn't," Stark says with a wink and a smile to take away the sting. "He's taken."

When that sinks in – a little too late, as Cherry seems to be waiting for Clint to deny it and it takes him just a fraction too long – Clint raises his palms at Stark in the classic _What the hell?_ gesture. He looks from Stark to the huffily departing Cherry back to Stark again. "Did you just... _cockblock_ me? You _did._ Why?" He's surprised. Just because Stark has a girlfriend – supposedly – it doesn't give him the right to involve himself in other people's sex lives. Pepper Potts doesn't even sound like a real name, and despite Natasha claiming to have met the woman, Clint half suspects Stark is making her up, because that's the kind of shit he'd pull. "Are _you_ in love with _me_?" Clint is vaguely aware that he's not completely sober.

"Just looking out for you, buddy," Stark says. "I really don't want to know what the Black Widow would do to someone who'd played around on her. Though it'd be interesting. Anatomically speaking."

Unfortunately Clint is in the middle of taking a sip of beer, so Stark's comment makes him spew IPA and snort it up his nose at the same time. It's messy. "Ah, shit." But his drinking companion has already signaled for a waitress to come clean it up, which she does, efficiently, and she's rewarded with a smile from Tony Stark.

"Are you crazy?" Clint demands as soon as she's gone. He genuinely wants to know.

"I was about to ask you that same question. Have you _seen_ what she can do? Of course you have. I only got to see, myself, the other week, and I have to say... pretty impressed. Did she used to be a gymnast? I didn't know people could bend that way."

"I can handle myself," Clint says between gritted teeth, though that isn't at all what he intended to say.

"Yes, but think of poor Sherry," says Stark.

Clint opens his mouth to correct him, but closes it again. Maybe it _is_ Sherry.

"She's just an innocent bystander," Stark continues. "Unless you put your dick in her. Then she's not really a bystander. Or innocent."

"Stark! Jesus." Clint rubs his face vigorously with his hands. How is it possible that he's having this conversation? He shakes his head in an attempt to clear it. "Look, that is... that is totally beside the point. Natasha has nothing to do with this." He wasn't lying. It wasn't what Stark thought. "She wouldn't care. Look, she's my partner. In a strictly professional capacity."

Stark looks at him askance. "Really? You sure about that?"

"I _think_ I would know." He's proud of how certain he sounds, though the effect is ruined a bit when he hiccups at the end.

There's a long, uncomfortable silence as Stark stares at him without speaking. Clint looks back, unblinking, resolved. It's harder than he thought it would be. After a few seconds he can feel himself almost twitching, wanting to look away. A few more seconds and his eyes are starting to hurt from lack of moisture.

Finally, Stark breaks the contact, and Clint blinks in relief. "Okay," Stark says cheerfully. "Sorry. My bad. Want me to apologize to Carrie?"

Clint shakes his head and closes his eyes. "No, forget it."

"Okay, good, because I think she was pretty mad. Consolation round?"

"Sure, why not," Clint sighs.

//\\\//

Three Hulks dropping heavy cement blocks to the street below wake him up. Clint half jerks up in bed, eyes opening with difficulty, and makes out that someone is knocking rather forcefully on his door. For a second he thinks if he ignores it it'll go away, but it just keeps going, sounding more pissed off by the second.

He pads to the front door on bare feet and opens it. He's somehow not surprised to find Natasha on the other side. Not because there are few others who would be knocking on his door, but because it sounded like her kind of knocking.

She steps past him without speaking, stalking right into the living area and down the hallway to his bedroom.

His sleep-and-alcohol-fuzzed brain takes a moment to catch up. "Good morning," he says to no one, closing the door.

"It's afternoon." Natasha returns, her expression less tense.

Clint yawns and sleepily scratches an itch on his arm, which draws her gaze to his naked chest. "You woke me up," he says defensively. "By the way... why did you wake me up?"

"I thought there might be a situation."

"A situation."

"Yeah... you disappeared. I was worried, okay?" She says this as if being forced to confess an unpardonable sin. "After Ankara, I was concerned you might have ... made some poor decisions."

Clint's mouth drops open. Of all the unfair things to bring up. "That was when we first met! And it was a different time zone!"

"And you know, the whole Loki thing... you haven't really been acting yourself lately," Natasha says delicately, deliberately avoiding his eyes.

Clint crosses his arms over his chest. "I'm me. Maybe I'm still working some stuff out, but I'm still me."

Natasha holds up a placating hand. "I know," she says, sounding slightly apologetic. "I'll go. I just wanted to make sure you were okay, since you had a lot to drink last night."

How would she even know....? "Let me get this straight," Clint says slowly. "Did Stark _tattle_ on me?"

"I'm not saying where I got my intel from," she responds coolly.

"That _son_ of a _bitch_." Clint passes several happy moments imagining painful ways he can pay Stark back. It won't be a shot from a distance, either. He'd gladly get his hands dirty for this endeavor.

"Why do you have that weird smile on your face?"

"No reason." Clint snaps back to the here and now, deflecting her suspicious look with an exaggerated yawn and stretch. "Let's go for breakfast."

"It's three o'clock in the afternoon."

"Lunch, then. Early dinner?" He starts heading for the shower. "I'll get cleaned up."

He hears Natasha open the fridge, studying the meager contents. He'd purchased a few things when he first arrived, in case he got hungry and didn't feel like going out. "I'll make you a grilled-cheese sandwich."

Clint stops in his tracks, turning around. "You _will_?" he says in amazement. The Black Widow is offering to cook for him? Stranger things haven't happened. 

"I can _make_ a grilled-cheese sandwich," Natasha says, looking offended.

"All right," he says, trying not to sound doubtful but not really succeeding.

When Clint exits the bathroom twenty minutes later, the apartment smells like someone tried to set it on fire. "I can't wait to eat my sandwich, Gnat," he calls down the hall, because he just can't resist.

"It burned," she calls back.

"Really?"

They walk to Fontaine for crepes, because they both have an unspoken love for them and indulging this gluttony is one of their guilty secrets. The place is closed, but the owner is there and serves them anyway. They're not recognized by anyone on the way, which is a relief. Immediately after "the Manhattan incident," it seemed he couldn't take a leak without some reporter shoving a microphone in his face. Or worse, encountering an eager fan who desperately wanted to touch his bow.

It's not really surprising, of course, that they'd be less recognizable here. They hadn't courted the attention to begin with ("Oh good, I've always wanted to be a recognizable spy," Natasha had murmured), and anyway, they're decidedly boring compared with their counterparts, a genetically engineered superhuman from seven decades ago, a Hulk, Tony Stark, and a literal demigod. Also, neither of them are currently sporting skin-tight clothing of any kind. They're in jeans and sunglasses, a white t-shirt and navy blue hoodie for Clint, while Natasha's wearing a loose-fitting sweater that exposes a shoulder and threatens more. Her bright red hair is kind of a beacon, but really they don't much resemble superheroes who helped save the world from a hostile alien invasion.

Clint gets the savory Tuscan crepe, while Natasha gets the "Sundae Afternoon," which involves two kinds of ice cream, bananas, walnuts, chocolate sauce and whipped cream. Halfway through, they switch plates. Natasha has picked up a newspaper on the way, and they both toss aside the A section, which is still reporting on things they'd both rather put behind them. Instead, Natasha starts doing the crossword while Clint peruses the auto section for motorcycles. _Not_ that he's going to get one, but if he did, he'd like to see what's available.

"'Woman arrested for bunny hoarding,'" Natasha reads, obviously having moved on from the crossword. "Third offense. 'Previously when meeting with her probation officer, there were no actual rabbits in the house, but he did notice a half-empty 10-pound bag of carrots.'" She sounds amazed and delighted.

"This world... Sometimes, I just don't know if it's worth saving," says Clint. He glances at her out of the corner of his eye. She's still reading the article, biting a fingernail, and her smile is wide and unguarded. She could pass for a college student on spring break. His chest feels tight to see her this way, relaxed and almost... happy. They don't often get moments like this. He realizes he's smiling too, and if she were to glance up, she might see the way he's looking at her and misunderstand, so Clint turns back to his portion of the paper quickly.

After lunch they take the long way back to his place. They pop open a couple of beers, argue over the TV ( _Aliens_ or _Toy Story 3_ ), wonder if it'd be worse to be eaten by a bear or a shark (Natasha: bear; Clint: shark), decide that they are definitely, for sure going to the gym to work off the crepes they just ate, and finally fall asleep on the couch watching _Animal Cops: Miami._

Natasha drools on Clint's hoodie and doesn't even offer to wash it afterward.

//\\\//

They get orders the next day. 

Clint's surprised they're trusting him enough to put him out in the field again so soon – he'd assumed a battery of psych tests and training scenarios were in his immediate future, and he's grateful that's not the case. The good thing about being brainwashed by a demigod, he supposes, is that the hapless human at the end of the stick gets the benefit of the doubt.

Natasha gets posted to Belarus; his assignment's in Ulaanbaatar. He masks his disappointment. They've been separated before, of course, but he doesn't remember it ever being this hard. He wonders if what Loki did to him has shaken his confidence, has changed his instincts, his combat skills. His performance in Manhattan doesn't count – that was an all-or-nothing deal. Clint was only one of six against a horde of hostiles; not a whole lot of subtlety was involved. Now that he's on regular assignment again, it might be for the best if he's not the one watching her back for awhile, until he knows for sure the extent to which his skills have been compromised. He doesn't think he could take it if something happened to her on his account.

Still, he resents the need for caution. He's a selfish asshole and doesn't want to be Clint Barton, Unknown Quantity; he just wants to feel normal, and being with Nat is the only time he thinks he might understand what that word means, no matter where they are or what they're doing. If he asks her, or if she even senses that he needs her, she'll come with him, he knows it. But Clint can't do that to her, he can't risk it.

And that's why he packs what he needs and heads to the airport without saying goodbye.

//\\\//

"I don't know how you can work with her!" Agent Donnelly shouts over comms. "She is one hot piece!"

This is why Clint hates working with other people. S.H.I.E.L.D. has better trained and more intelligent agents than most, but they still can't seem to weed out all the dumbasses. He feigns ignorance. "Who?"

Donnelly, his co-pilot, looks at him as if he's crazy. "Who? Romanoff!"

They're flying fairly low, somewhere over the Gobi. They've just passed over the sand dunes of Khongoryn Els so they're close to the drop point. He should have known this was going to be a cakewalk mission; their trust in him only went so far. This was a test. His role the last three days has basically consisted of "transport."

Clint doesn't mind too much, though. He's enjoyed putting this quinjet through her paces. It's good to know there are still some things he can do in his sleep.

"Never thought about it much." And he hasn't. Natasha's physical attributes are part and parcel of who she is, and can't be separated from everything else he knows about her. All the words he knows that could be used to characterize the attractiveness of a woman are laughably inadequate. No one word can possibly hope to encapsulate what Natasha is.

"Oh come on, Barton. Bullshit," Donnelly laughs.

Something captures Clint's attention on the ground. He's not even sure, at first, why he's suddenly disquieted. Something, out of the corner of his eye–

There's no time to shout a warning or even to curse. Clint maneuvers sharply to the right, but one of the rocket-propelled grenades clips the wing and explodes, sending them on a not-quite-free-fall to the ground. Both fortunately and unfortunately, this isn't Clint's first time handling a lamed quinjet. He does what he can to pad the landing, but they still hit hard, rattling them in their seats, sand and smoke billowing into the aircraft in a hot, dusty cloud that makes it nearly impossible to breathe. He and Donnelly are able to get out of their seats and pull some masks on before they race to exit the wreckage.

That's when the second explosion goes off.

//\\\//

People are shouting. It seems to come from very far away.

Hot. He's so hot. Something's burning him. His fingers sink into it. Sand.

He wants to open his eyes but it hurts, the light's too bright. His head is pounding.

There's a lot of commotion. He turns to look and sees Donnelly on the ground next to him. He's still. Very still. And covered with blood.

The voices. He can make them out more distinctly now, and realizes they're not speaking English. The people the voices belong to might realize any second that Clint's moving. He aches all over but he reaches for his side arm. The movement makes him want to throw up.

But instead of his gun his hand clasps another hand, the hand of someone who has run up to him saying his name. Suddenly his head is being cradled on something much softer than the desert, his mask is pulled off – air, blessed air – and he makes out Natasha's features, her face wet with perspiration and something else, her hair sticking to her face.

Now Clint realizes that he must be dead. There's no other explanation for why he would be seeing Natasha, here, now. Natasha is four thousand miles away in Belarus, probably using her feminine wiles to ply trade secrets from a billionaire financier.

"Clint," she says. Why does she keep saying his name? Is that what he wants to hear before he dies? Is that what his mind is doing? Makes sense. He closes his eyes again.

Her hands are all over him, feeling, searching. She's not gentle and he winces. If he's dead, why does he hurt so much? "Clint," she says again. "Focus. Are you hurt? Is this your blood?" Her voice is calm but her eyes are large in her pale face. "Keep your eyes open, keep them on me, Clint. We're getting you out of here. The medic's coming. You're going to be okay." She says it again, but it's under her breath and he can barely hear her.

So, not dead then.

"What–" Clint's voice is a croak. Natasha opens a canteen and trickles a bit of water into his mouth. He tries again. "What are you doing here?"

Her eyes are wide and focused intently on him, and there's not a trace of makeup on her face. It's the most naked he's ever seen her, and over the years he's seen plenty. "I..." she starts, but can't seem to finish her sentence.

She doesn't look away though.

//\\\//

Clint has three broken ribs, a concussion, and a number of lacerations caused by flying debris. He has a particularly nasty gash in his left thigh, but he's lucky because whatever cut him missed the major femoral arteries. It's luck, pure luck and chance, that he's not Donnelly, who was in the exact right place to catch the stray speeding piece of metal that severed much of his head from his neck.

They know what happened now, know there was a leak, know the quinjet was targeted by several RPGs. Clint has been absolved of any wrongdoing. Which is great, except they still won't reinstate him to active duty. In fact, he's on a mandatory two-week medical leave, which pisses him off.

He first received treatment at Achtan Elite in Mongolia, but was quickly transferred Stateside when he proved to be a less than ideal hospital patient. He was at Inova Alexandria for another few days before discharging himself AMA. Fury wasn't thrilled. In his words, "If your dumb ass wants to compromise your recovery, you go right ahead, Agent Barton. I ain't your mama. But you are still on medical leave. Don't even _think_ about setting foot on base. _Any_ base."

Clint spends most of his days in loose sweatpants and a t-shirt, out on the balcony, with an old fish bowl that might have once held water and real live fish, but which is now only filled with colored aquarium gravel. He uses the small pebbles as projectiles for target practice, and the pigeons have quickly learned to stay out of his radius. Also, he might be the reason his downstairs neighbor's potted flowers don't have petals anymore. He doesn't want to get rusty while he's on this bullshit leave, though after throwing awhile his ribs hurt and he has to stop.

Sometime after noon, there's a knock on his door. It's Natasha, of course, with a couple of takeout containers, and he lets her in without a word. She's used to his surly moods of late. Clint's been throwing pebbles all morning and he's aching, which she sees immediately.

"Get into bed," she says.

"Only if you come with me," he says, just to annoy her.

"I plan to," she responds, which shuts him up.

Clint gets into bed with bad grace, struggling to stuff a couple of pillows behind his back before Natasha takes over. 

She hands him a fork and one of the takeout boxes, which contains stuffed crepes. Today his has ham, mushrooms, and Swiss cheese. Natasha leaves the room to get them a couple of cold sodas, then kicks off her shoes and sits on the bed facing him, their legs touching. It's good to feel the comforting pressure of her against him.

Clint's a little surprised that when they're done eating, Natasha lies down next to him. She wiggles around a bit to get into a good position, jarring his ribs and making him wince, until he lifts an arm and drapes it over her shoulder, which is the only way to make this comfortable. They've done this plenty of times before, a friendly, casual gesture, but somehow this feels different. At least it does for him, and the nearness of her and the smell of her hair is doing something to him that he hopes won't become too big an issue.

"I'm leaving for Seoul in a few hours," she says.

"Oh." Clint feels disappointment and envy. He wants to be going to Seoul, too. Or any mission. Instead, he's going to be shut up in this apartment throwing rocks at birds.

Natasha twists her head to look at him. "You'll be on active duty again soon."

He makes a noncommittal sound and doesn't meet her eyes, feeling sorry for himself but not wanting her to know, though she knows anyway, of course.

"Clint," she says, and there's something strange about her voice, which gets his attention. He turns to look at her, and before he knows what's happening, Natasha has grabbed his face and smashed her lips against his. It's painful and inelegant and everything he's ever wanted, even if he doesn't know what the hell is going on.

Natasha breaks the kiss but keeps her hands where they are. "You're an idiot," she says, looking amused.

"Hey, words hurt," Clint responds automatically, but he's looking for answers in her eyes. What he sees there makes his own widen in surprise. "Gnat... do you... _like _me?"__

At that she lets out a laugh, not exactly the response he might have hoped for. He's obviously looking very indignant, because she pats him gently on the shoulder, though the mirth hasn't left her expression. "Maybe this will answer your question," she says, leaning closer, then puts her tongue in his ear. Clint nearly jerks off the bed.

"Ow," he says after a pause, placing a hand on his tender ribs. He adjusts his pants surreptitiously to try and hide the evidence of how she's affecting him.

Natasha stops him, placing a hand right on that hard part of him that wants her attention so badly, and slowly strokes him through the soft cotton material.

At first Clint's too stunned to respond. He wonders if he's actually still in a coma on the quinjet and he's imagining all this. He doesn't even want to look at her in case that makes her stop, but after a few more seconds pass he can't resist. He finds her looking directly at him, in that straightforward way she has, no embarrassment, no hesitation.

He grabs her wrist, pulling her hand off him, and in a quick, fluid motion, despite the pain, he uses his superior size to turn and lean over her, pinning her hand to the pillow.

Natasha watches him, waiting to see what he'll do next, and when he hesitates, she lifts her head and kisses him again. He can't help himself, it's as if the flood gates have opened. He returns the kiss, releasing all of his pent-up desire, pressing his body hard against hers. He lets go of her wrist so he can feel the swell of one of her breasts in his eager hand. It's a lot to bombard her with all at once, and Clint braces himself for her to shove him back, aim a knee at his groin, twist his arm around his back, _something_ , but all she does is press right back against him, hooking a knee over his hip and wrapping an elbow around his neck to hang on. Then she runs her tongue over his lower lip and bites it.

Whatever semblance of control he was maintaining dissolves like sugar in hot water. Lust and need take over. This is Natasha, and he's wanted this for weeks. Years, if he's being honest. Clint slants his mouth over hers, delving deep with his tongue, and as the kiss deepens, he inches her shirt up, his hands all over the lovely bare skin he's exposing.

Then Natasha makes a move that neatly turns the tables, and suddenly she's straddling him, careful not to put pressure on his injured ribs. Clint's glad to see her breathing hard, chest rising up and down rapidly, her eyes half lidded, her mouth slightly bruised and parted. He doesn't know how he would have reacted if she'd seemed completely unaffected by what they'd just been doing.

When after a few moments Natasha doesn't move, Clint nudges her with his hips. "Subtle," she says, smiling a bit.

"I think we're a little past subtle."

She leans back against his legs. "I'm not going to fuck you, Clint."

Disappointment washes over him. He sighs and stares at the ceiling, his entire body going slack (well, maybe not his _entire_ body), wondering what sorts of terrible crimes he must have committed in a past life to deserve this. Come to think of it, maybe it was this one.

"See, when I do..." He looks back at her. "...I want you at one hundred percent." Natasha runs delicate fingers over his bandaged ribs. "You'll need to be at peak condition, Barton, because I'm going to use you every way I know how."

She's captured Clint's undivided attention. "I'm ready now," he invites, lifting his hips and rubbing his erection against her, which feels so good that he lets out a small sound of pleasure. He's pleased to see that her eyes flutter shut. "Try me."

"Mmm." Natasha clamps her thighs, stilling him, then looks at her watch. "Not enough time. Don't try to cheat me." Clint remembers Seoul. She climbs off him and moves to sit next to his shoulder. "I'll see you in a week. Work on getting better."

A sudden terrible thought occurs to him. "Fury didn't put you up to this, did he?"

Natasha raises an eyebrow, looking amused. "Hawk... you think Fury would encourage fraternization between his agents? I think he'd rather see you dead."

Clint wants to tell her how he feels, what she means to him, how the Earth moves because of her, but he can't find the words. "Gnat... Be safe," is what he says, and the look on her face tells him she heard all the rest of it anyway.

Natasha presses another kiss to his lips, then rises and straightens her clothes. She leans down to whisper in his ear.

"To be continued."

//\\\//

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. :-)


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